120,000 km Is Still Too Close 670
texchanchan writes: "BBC report: '...on 14 June, an asteroid (maybe as big as 120 meters in diameter)... made one of the closest-ever recorded approaches to the Earth.
..' but was only discovered three days later. This is well within the moon's orbit. 'If 2002MN had hit the Earth, it would have caused local devastation similar to that which occurred in Tunguska, Siberia, in 1908...'"
Just think.... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Just think.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Just think.... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Just think.... (Score:3, Interesting)
And the largest thermonuclear device ever exploded in the atmosphere period was done by the Soviets in 1961 [hiroshima.jp] and was ~50MT.
bringing it back on-topic, sort ot (Score:4, Insightful)
U.S. Govt (Score:3, Interesting)
Id like to thank the United States government for CUTTING BACK funds to search for stuff like this. I think currently we map 5% of the skies? No wonder it was discovered 3 days later, it was in the other 95% of the skies we dont have enough money to look at.
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:2, Funny)
Convince them they can get rid of illegal immigrants by placing them on passing asteroids. That'll get funding back in a hurry.
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:2, Informative)
My favorite quote is from Dr. David Morrison
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:3, Funny)
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:3, Funny)
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:3, Interesting)
This, even more than the annoying and useless nature of children, epitomizes why we as human beings deserve extinction. If we can't be bothered to put even a trace of effort in fending off a danger that has a demonstrated track record of eradicating entire classes of species o this planet (including virtually every surface animal larger than a medium-sized rodent at one time), then we, in our collective and profound stupidity, absolultely deserve to be eradicated and replaced by a more competent species, likely one that will emerge some tens of millions of years hence from some small creature poking around our ashes.
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:2)
Someday we might have the ability to prevent such a happening, but if one does occure in my lifetime and wipes out a few thousand species, I'm not going to feel guilty that I might have been able to prevent it.
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:3, Funny)
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:5, Informative)
This will become more scary in the future, when there is some capability to deal with an asteroid on a collision course. When we get to that point, we'll be complacent and will eventually end up being sucker-punched by one of these asteroids coming "out of the sun".
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:3, Funny)
Fools! They should just slap a sheet of welder's glass [utoledo.edu] on their telescopes.
Where do I pick up my Nobel Prize?
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:3, Interesting)
It approached the earth from the direction of the sun, but that does not mean that it has always resided within the orbit of earth. Although I haven't seen what the orbit looks like, there's a good chance that the orbit is highly elliptical and therefore, it spends a good amount of time outside the earth's orbit frequently enough to have been spotted in the past, assuming we were searching enough.
Also, just because an asteroid resides within the earth's orbit, does not mean we can't observe it, even from the ground. It just limits the amount of time each day that it is visible. Both venus and mercury are within the earth's orbit, but we're still able to observe them from the ground.
There will always be blind spots. And there will always be comets that are heading this way that we've never had the chance to observe because they were never close enough. The best we could do is get 100% of the asteroids that orbit the sun nearby.
-Restil
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:3, Insightful)
1. What would we have done if found out 1 month before it passed by Earth? Send Bruce Willis out to blow it up with a nuclear bomb? Get a really big pool cue and bank shot it off Mars?
2. Why can't Europe get off its butt and save mankind for change? Why is it always the taxpayers of the United States that have to save the Earth? We did enough in the 20th Century. Its time for us to take a century and let France save the Earth for a change. God knows we saved their asses enough.
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:2, Insightful)
1. What would we have done if found out 1 month before it passed by Earth? Send Bruce Willis out to blow it up with a nuclear bomb? Get a really big pool cue and bank shot it off Mars?
This particular asteroid wouldn't have been the end of the world, only a section of it. If it had been on a collision course with a populated area and we detected it, people could have been evacuated.Re:U.S. Govt (Score:3, Insightful)
Uh, excuse me? Evcuate an area the size of Siberia? Where are you going to put millions and millions of refuges. When an asteroid hits the Earth, you don't try to figure out who to get out of the way, you start praying to your favorite deity. There would be no way we could move all the folks. Just look at what happens in Florida when they have Hurricanes and try to evacuate folks.
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:3, Insightful)
Interesting thought but, I'm not sure we'd even know what hemishphere to evacuate.
Recall the pondering and headscratching that goes on whenever one of our larger satellites' orbit decays. The speculation on where it will come down would be downright amusing if it weren't so serious.
Any astrophysisists out there know how well we could calculate the impact area?
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:3, Informative)
Wildly OT (Score:5, Interesting)
That actually makes sense.
Fifty years ago, half the population of the U.S. was employed in agriculture. Today, it's less than 2%, and they grow more food than the country can eat. And many of them are paid not to farm. If you suddenly put nearly half the working population out of work, then add in all the women entering the work force who didn't used to be there
I think we're starting to approach the kinds of problems that have until now only been considered in speculative sci-fi. When we only need about 10% of the population to work to provide for everyone, what will the other 90% do for a living? And how do we pick which 10% it's going to be?
Re:Wildly OT (Score:2)
Re:Agreed. Free EuroDisney passes for Americans! (Score:3, Insightful)
(If you want to talk absolute loss of life, of course, the Russians have the UK, the US, and everyone else put together beat.)
And yes, I'm an American. And a veteran. I'm proud of my service (including Desert Storm) and I certainly don't want to minimize the American contribution to winning the World Wars. But to imply that we were the sole factor in "saving Europe" is ahistorical nonsense.
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:2, Insightful)
I can see that we may be able to relocate people away from the blast zone, but that would probably be difficult to predict precisely... Imagine telling the entire state of California to quickly get 2000 km away from LA... in the next 24 hours...
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:3, Funny)
Sure, it wouldn't benefit you. But those of us with the foresight to have our escape pods ready will be sitting pretty.
Secret Freemason-built counter-earth for rich people on the opposite side of the sun, here I come!
----------
We all live under Monkey Law [monkeylaw.org].
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:2)
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:5, Insightful)
Nothing on you, but this hypocrisy is everywhere. I live in Nevada, and I remember a few years ago the whole community was up in arms about the low pay teachers got and the horrible conditions of the schools including overcrowding and buildings that were falling apart. So November rolls around, and on the ballot is a bill to help teachers out and repair/build new schools. 2% Yes, 98% no.
That's human nature. People love to bitch until it's going to cost them time or money. I'm not exactly sure of the exact odds of our planet going to crap do to a massive asteroid collision, but I'm fairly sure some 7 to 8 digit numbers are in the equation. If most people saw an "Asteroid Detection & Prevention" bill on their ballot, they'd laugh themselves stupid.
I really don't think this is offtopic either, I'm pointing out that watching 100% of the sky would be no simple or cheap task, and it's completely not worth it considering what an incredible long shot it would be to actually ever have to worry about it.
Re:U.S. Govt (Score:3, Interesting)
That's human nature.
It's also because we're already paying money in torrential floods for education (up to $9K per student per year in some states) and getting almost nothing in return except exquisitely appointed administrative offices. We're *way*
overtaxed as it is.
Ever wonder just where all the money is?
- Never any new books
- No supplies
- No athletic equipment
- No uniforms
- No funded clubs
- No funded extracurricular activities
- No (or little) technology
- No (or few) full time librarians
- No (or few) full time support staff
- No air conditioning
- Classes conducted in trailers
- Teachers always underpaid
- Buildings falling apart
Yet, somehow, we are spending over a quarter million *per year* on each classroom in some cases. Say the teacher makes $40K. Where is the other TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS A YEAR????
Now, to bring this back on topic:
What guarantee is there that money allocated for this project won't end up in the paneling and mahogany desk for some executive's office instead of going to equipment and research staff? That would be a good priority if funding is approved.
Just another $0.02
Who needs terrorists anymore? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Who needs terrorists anymore? (Score:2)
Only if we start the wholesale shredding of our constitution in order to support destroying the asteroids. Which of course, wouldn't really be necessary and, in any event is already occuring anyway, at the behest of some militant, islamic fundamentalist terrorists, who have (in this respect, at least) already won.
Other detection methods? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Other detection methods? (Score:2)
Too close... (Score:3, Funny)
Closer and closer ... (Score:4, Funny)
Is somebody aiming these things?
Re:Closer and closer ... (Score:2)
Clendathu (Score:5, Funny)
Every time we hear about one of these it's closer than the last time.
Is somebody aiming these things?
Analysis shows that they are originating from a far-away planet. An ugly planet. A bug planet.
GMD
OT: Bugs As Scapegoats (Score:5, Insightful)
Did they ever say how those bugs were shooting the asteroids?
I have never read the book -- I only saw the movie. I, too, was a bit baffled at this. However, I remember reading a very interesting letter to the editor in the LA Times when this movie came out. His claim was that all the critics who were blasting the movie as a violent fantasy were missing the "real point" of the movie -- that it was an anti-war film. In the movie, there never was any explanation for how these bugs were supposedly launching and steering these asteroids towards Earth. In fact when you first see Klendathu you see the bugs possess no technology. Yet, all that was needed was for the leaders to claim the bugs did it and everyone was willing to go to war with them. The author of this letter was pointing out that this same kind of mindless acceptance of a convienient scapegoat was the same stuff that the director (a German) saw first-hand growing up in Nazi Germany. To further hammer the point home, director Verhoeven peppered the film full of rediculous propaganda commericals.
That letter made me look at that movie from a different perspective. It is chilling that in the film, no one questions whether the bugs were even capable, let alone willing, to commit such an act of aggression against Earth. I'm sure we can all think of examples here on Earth of peoples being too eager to go to war without a good reason.
GMD
They're alert arn't they (Score:2, Redundant)
I didnt really want to know that.
Amazing how we survived (Score:4, Interesting)
Something tells me that the people pushing this fear either have an interest in investments in related science or in (gasp) selling newspapers or advertising space!
If we get hit by a big rock, we'll dust ourselves off. If there is an ELE, we'll have a challenge. Maybe the best thing for the human race, all things considered. At least it could give us a unified rallying point....
Re:Amazing how we survived (Score:2)
There's a slight difference between the present and when such events occured in the past: A thousand years ago, nobody in Europe would have noticed if half of North America was flattened by an asteroid.
The probability of an asteroid wiping out the human race is miniscule. The probability of an asteroid killing large numbers of people is not.
It's relative (Score:2)
But I agree, worrying about it is useless... All the indignation seems to ignore the following two facts:
1) If the gub'ment did know about it, they would tell us.
2) There is anything they could do about it if they knew about it. Morgan Freeman ain't President and Bruce Willis ain't going to save you folks!
As an astronomer friend of mine used to say -- "If there was an asteroid heading for the earth why would they tell us?".
Re:It's relative (Score:2)
doh...
Not true (Score:2)
So we haven't had anything really nasty happen for five thousand years? Big deal. The last big round of extinctions occurred maybe 40,000 years ago. Maybe it'll be another 40,000 years, but I wouldn't bet the future of my species on that assumption! These are regular events. If you believe some theories of evolution, such disasters helped create our own species.
Let's think about this for a moment (Score:3, Insightful)
On the other hand, what consequences? The worst that we are aware of was an ice age that screwed the dinos. (possibly)
And it seems our unevolved ancestors survived. If we can't survive the same (as a species, I don't mean as individuals), then we sure haven't evolved in the right direction.
The second worst I can think of is Tunguska. Did the world stop when that happened? Did even the nation state it occured in collapse? No and No. Would it suck to see Ottawa, Toronto (well maybe not so much), Washington, Chicago, or Paris blown off the map? Yes, yes it would. But would it bring the world to an end? Probably not. Would it kill off mankind? Probably not.
Would there be consequences? Hard to see how extensive. Tunguska didn't cause a war. And anyplace that got smoked by a rock would get a huge rescue effort from the rest of the globe. Not much consolation if you live there, but still helpful in rebuilding and saving those that could be saved around the edges.
Then, step a step further out and say: What can we do to stop it? If something the size of Texas comes for us, I doubt we can shoot it down, or that it would do that much good. If something smaller comes, odds go up. But we are not even accurately tracking all this debris!
And once you pass a certain low-end threshold, it isn't worth addressing - it'll either burn up or the hole it will punch into the planet isn't large enough to (globally) be concerned about.
OTOH, what will it cost us to address rocks the size of Texas? Answer: a big damn checkbook and very damn deep pockets. We're staggering even trying to get a not-so-useful, scaled-back, quickly-probably-obsolescent space station up and that's an effort (of a sort) of the international community!.
OTOH, we've got a war on drugs, a war on terrorism, the refief of Africa, peacekeeping and peacemaking all over the globe, a global aids crisis, the funding of new biotech that could save many many lives, etc.
All of things can make valid claims on our time and effort. Should we spend the money where we're pretty sure it can be immediately beneficial and life saving, or throw it at something we're a long way from being able to handle? We've laboured in ignorance for thousands of years, another hundred probably won't matter a lot. And maybe by then, with other tech advancements, the cost of attacking the problem will drop.
I'm not entirely saying there is no risk. I'm saying the cost of addressing it EFFECTUALLY is very high. That same money can far more beneficially be expended dealing with other terrestrial crises. At some point down the road, the problem will be more cost effective to deal with, and hopefully a few more key crises will have been put to rest on Earth allowing us to focus more of our attention on these external potential problems.
Of course, a rock could drop on me tonight. If so, unless it was the size of Texas, most of the universe would just keep on ticking. And I wouldn't be around to care.
Then again, once you hit karma cap, what's the point in living anymore? *grin*
why worry? (Score:4, Insightful)
and you cant do anything about,
and cant really see it,
you just waste a lot of mental energy.
Re:why worry? (Score:2)
siberia (Score:2)
Re:siberia (Score:3, Interesting)
Its actually not as bad as we /.'ers make it. (Score:4, Insightful)
Don't worry (Score:5, Funny)
Not going to change anything (Score:2, Interesting)
Until an asteroid actually smacks into Earth, the governments (specificly U.S) will continue to cut back funding for searching for these things. Hopefully, when an asteriod finally DOES hit us, it'll be one of the smaller ones, and only knock out a few thousand/million people.
Oh, the article! (Score:4, Interesting)
Yeah, right! The author has no idea how carefully STScI checks the HST pointing to make sure you don't look anywhere near the Sun...
The only way to detect these suckers coming in from the Sun side is radar or spacecraft telescopes at the Lagrange points, not earth-orbiting scopes. Those are just a handful of objects, though: for the vast majority, I expect robotic camera surveys are quite sufficient, if someone coughs up the money.
Alas, if one of these hits the earth, then "the terrorists will already have won"(TM) - or rather, they won't need to win.
Re:Oh, the article! (Score:3, Insightful)
What's worse is that even if you could avoid the Sun and look for such an asteroid, you'd still have a devil of a time. Asteroids are faint to start with, and anything near the Sun-Earth line would be showeing a small crescent phase. So the bugger wouldn't be very bright at all.
Assteroids... sheesh (Score:3, Funny)
These guys have obviously not tried my three alarm chilli and some of my homebrew. Talk about destruction... thank god there were no open flames near by last time.
Well, not to worry (Score:2)
See, I figure, anything big enough to do some real hurt coming from the direction of the sun, we should be able to notice by the eclipse...
"Gee, I didn't hear anything in the news about an eclipse- and since when did the moon get that shape?"
Run for your lives if you ever see an unscheduled eclipse, folks. Though I don't know where you'd run to, only that running would surely get your mind off of your impending doom.
Have a nice day!
Interesting name... (Score:2, Funny)
Does that stand for "Near Miss 2002" (in reverse, of course, so as to not sow fear, uncertainty, and doubt)?
Enough already. (Score:2, Funny)
I mean really, you sit there and watch the Simpsons how many times and you still haven't learned anything?
Here's the photo! (Score:4, Funny)
.
This isn't news! (Score:2)
Re:This isn't news! (Score:3, Funny)
graspee
Still relatively unlikely. (Score:3, Informative)
The Earth is about 7,926 miles (12,756 km) in diameter. Roughly 12,000 km, or about a tenth of the flyby distance. The chance of any object that comes within 120,000km of actually hitting the earth is about (0.1)^2, or roughly 1%. This is still unsettlingly likely, but it's not exactly doomsday.
Re:Still relatively unlikely. (Score:2)
Re:Still relatively unlikely. (Score:2)
Re:Still relatively unlikely. (Score:2)
It *did* impact... (Score:5, Funny)
2,000 square kilometres (Score:2)
Oh Yeah?!? (Score:4, Funny)
Then it's getting close to what a rogue Forrest Ranger can do in Colorado!
It won't be funded until there is a disaster (Score:5, Insightful)
Until there is a major loss of life due to an impact, there isn't going to be an research. Just hope that you're not under it, that it's not mistaken for an "act of terrorism", triggering a thermonuclear war, and that it's not much bigger than a hundred meters or so, like this one. Unless, of course, you're willing to live like a pauper and do the work yourself. I'm not.
There really is little you can do. So don't worry about it. The odds aren't really that high, but you don't know when your number is going to come up, either. Hopefully China will put a base on the moon and play "mine's bigger than yours" to everyone's benefit.
Makes you wonder if all the hoopla surrounding SETI; all that computing power; and all that money might be better spent scanning the night sky for dark blobs that might end life HERE as opposed to looking for little green men on hopelessly far away stars.
Re:It won't be funded until there is a disaster (Score:3)
This is one of those things that's impossible to know for sure, but they're probably making the right decision in this case. Consider this: The odds are rather low that in the next 100 years a large meteorite would cause a loss of life that would in any way compare to the more certain threats to life that we currently spend our money on.
Also consider that in 100 years, constructing a meteorite defense system would probably be a trivial task well within our means and budget. Why waste all our resources struggling to do it wrong now, when we can wait until we're advanced enough to deal with the problem?
Something similar to SETI ??? (Score:2, Interesting)
I understand SETI being useful and all that, but its gonna be a sad day if those Aliens reach us a couple of days after our extinction.
They might just think that cockroaches ruled the planet
See? (Score:2, Funny)
What are the odds (Score:2, Insightful)
But actually its still a small problem... (Score:5, Insightful)
1) "surface area" of the earth is:
A = pi * r^2 = 3.14 * 6,000^2 = 110,000,000 square kilometers
2) The area within the 120,000km radius is:
A = pi * r^2 = 3.14 * 60,000^2 = 11,000,000,000 square kilometers
3) The area of the asteroid is in practice infinitesimal compared with either of these measurements.
So to some approximation, the chances of the asteroid hitting earth if it travels within 120,000 km of the planet is:
110,000,000/11,000,000,000 = 0.01 = 1%
This is certainly not a zero probability, but it is still pretty small.
Of course this ignores a lot of factors, including the Earth's gravity well and the relative vectors of the two objects. A real calculation would reveal different probabilities.
But even when one of these asteroids passes this close - which is only known to have happened 6 times since we've been able to record these events (about 50 years?) - there is still only about a 1 in 100 chance it will hit the planet.
I'm going to be worrying a lot more about travelling on the highway than I am about asteroid collisions.
Re:But actually its still a small problem... (Score:4, Informative)
Yeah, but if you crash on the highway, you and your kids might die. If an asteroid hits the earth, millions or billions could die. So on a personal level, driving is more dangerous, but we're talking about the survival of the species here. It's not something to ignore.
Re:But actually its still a small problem... (Score:3)
Re:But actually its still a small problem... (Score:2)
3) The area of the asteroid is in practice infinitesimal compared with either of these measurements.
So to some approximation, the chances of the asteroid hitting earth if it travels within 120,000 km of the planet is:
110,000,000/11,000,000,000 = 0.01 = 1%
This is certainly not a zero probability, but it is still pretty small.
Of course this ignores a lot of factors, including the Earth's gravity well and the relative vectors of the two objects. A real calculation would reveal different probabilities.
I think the asteroid PASSED AT a distance of 120k km. So it did not pass WITHIN a distance of 120k km.
So the likelyhood to hit earth was
Of course it would be nice to know the incomming in advance. I prefered to take a flight to Australia in case it hits Europe and vice versa. But very likely the mass panic on earth would prevent much live saving in such circumstances.
angel'o'sphere
Better math (Score:3, Informative)
Incoming asteriod is a point particle.
Diameter of the Earth is 12,000km.
Asteroid will pass within 120,000km of Earth's center (possibly less).
The question then becomes:
Choose a random point within a circle of radius 120,000km.
What is the probability that this point lies within a circle of radius 6000km?
In other words, what are the relative sizes of the two circles?
(pi * 6000^2)/(pi * 120000^2) = 0.0025 = 0.25%
-- Brian
Assessing the Odds - When to Panic (Score:3, Insightful)
meteor crater arizona (Score:2)
for other possibilities, see: this page [umd.edu]
What about the moon? (Score:4, Insightful)
How big would it have to be to knock the moon from its orbit? Or even alter the moon's orbit at all? And if so, what impact on our environment here would it have? If we had no moon, no tides, etc., what would that do to earth life?
Are we expecting... (Score:5, Funny)
Bush declares a "War on Asteroids".
Bush: Our nation faces a threat to our freedoms, and the stakes could not be higher. We are the target of enemies who boast they want to kill -- kill all Americans, kill all Jews, kill all Christians, kill all Muslims, and kill all mankind. We've seen that type of hate before -- although they're near misses, the only possible response is to confront it, and to defeat it.
This enemy tries to hide behind a peaceful cosmos, yet its murderous intent is obvious.
We will, no doubt, face new challenges. Make no mistake. Although we have absolutely no idea where you are, when you'll come, or even how big you are - wherever you are, whether in our solar system, in our galaxy, and outside the galaxy, we WILL track you down, and we'll defeat you.
Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]
So what are you going to do about it??? (Score:5, Insightful)
Do yourself a favor and think about it. Scary stuff this may be, but how is it news?? Enlighten me.
This is becoming routine... (Score:3, Funny)
Anyone remember this FUD [cnn.com] from CNN three months and one day ago? That asteroid came from the direction of the sun [slashdot.org] as well.
At any rate, our scientists are getting better. Last time they didn't know about the asteroid until four days after it missed us. This time they learned of the asteroid three days after the fact. At this rate, they should be able to tell us when we've been hit by a killer asteroid on the same day it hits us.
Re:Where would it have hit? (Score:2)
Re:Where would it have hit? (Score:2, Funny)
Why, the surface, of course.
Re:Where would it have hit? (Score:2)
Re:should we make a movie about it? (Score:2)
Lucifer's Hammer [indigo.ca]
Re:should we make a movie about it? (Score:2)
Re:should we make a movie about it? (Score:2)
Re:We're dead (Score:2)
Personally, I'd rather us detect it at least several years in advance so we *might* have a chance of doing something about it. Detecting it the day it impacts doesn't leave a lot of options, except stick your head between you legs and kiss your @ss goodbye!
Re:Eyes Closed? (Score:4, Insightful)
"Space is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mindboggingly big it is. I mean you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist, but that's just peanuts to space."
And while a 120 meter rock ain't exactly something you want whacking your neighborhood at high speeds, it looks really really small when it's 120,000 km away. Not exactly a naked-eye sort of thing, and looking with telescopes or whatever takes resources which aren't currently being made available.
Re:Eyes Closed? (Score:2)
Seriously, NASA _could_ monitor the entire sky for near-Earth asteroids (NEAs), but the guv'mint only gives them enough funding to monitor a few percent of the sky. After all, we can't spend several million dollars on some wacked-out space-doomsday hippies! Not when we've got hundreds of billions earmarked for corporate welfare, a ludicrous and infeasible "missle defense system", and...oh yeah, the never-ending "war on terror". (for those keeping score, 10 million / 100 billion = 0.0001; *clearly* a fractional increase in spending that our budget cannot bear).
No one ever accused the human race of not being shortsighted. Or maybe someone did, but they were probably wrong.
Re:Tunguska (Score:2)
Re:If a giant asteroid is going to hit me (Score:2, Funny)
Re:If a giant asteroid is going to hit me (Score:5, Insightful)
The other major concern. If this asteroid hit a nuclear capable country (and there are quite a few of them), if there was no prior knowledge of the hit it would be very easy to confuse a meteor stike with a nuclear attack. You would have the miles of devastation and the mushroom cloud. Imagine if it were to hit india or pakistan right now. The other side might retalliate from the perceived attack before they ever figured out it was just a meteor. The only difference would be the lack of radioactive fallout.
Even in the US, where we have suffienent technology to quickly detect and determine what is going on, it still took us half a day to get a grip on what was happening on September 11. All day long there were car bombs going off that didn't exist. The Vice President ordered a plane shot down that didn't exist. And 9/11, as tragic as it was, would be insignificant compared to the type of disaster that a 120 meter rock would cause, especially if it hit a populated area.
Knowing that Washington DC was going to get wiped off the face of the planet by a meteor (literally) 6 hours before it happened would cause a lot of panic, but it would save a lot of after the fact confusion. We would be mounting rescue efforts instead of mounting for a nuclear response against an unknown enemy.
-Restil
Another solution for Asteroids (Score:2)
Re:Collision (Score:3, Interesting)
A problem in terms of destroying the moon? Check out http://janus.astro.umd.edu/astro/impact.html [umd.edu] and play around with numbers.
The numbers for this one (~100 meters at 10 km/sec) hitting the moon are a 15 megaton explosion, a quake of magnitude 6.4, and a new crater. This wouldn't have any impact on the earth.
Now, if you're talking destruction of the moon, that could be a problem. According to the site, it would take a rock 400km in diameter, travelling at 55km/s, to destroy the moon. A pretty unlikely occurence, in other words.